| ▲ | daedrdev 13 hours ago |
| I do feel like there is some man shaking fist at cloud here. The post dismisses airpods, yet they are one of the most popular products in the US, with like 75% of young people owning a pair, great quality, features, and battery life. I dont think a swappable battery is even a good feature, the parts would be tiny and break easily given their size not to mention how often they could get lost |
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| ▲ | Gigachad 13 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| Hot swappable batteries kind of became not so important after battery banks and fast charging became a thing. Makes more sense to carry one battery bank that can charge anything than to have 2-3 phone batteries in your bag (which would be exposed to puncture too). I still think the price of battery replacements is way too high from apple. It's $150 AUD here which feels far and beyond the cost of the part cost itself. |
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| ▲ | doubled112 13 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I realize we're talking about Airpods, but hot swappable batteries don't make sense to me either anymore. I seem to have power almost everywhere. My phone spends a surprising amount of time on a charger. Most of the day while I'm at home, it's on a charger. I used to keep one at the office on my desk. The car has a charger too, and CarPlay so you might as well plug it in. I'm not sure if it's a coping mechanism for poor battery life or just convenience. For long days outdoors, I've also got a booster pack in the car with USB ports and an inverter (120V) that gets some use. | | |
| ▲ | raw_anon_1111 12 hours ago | parent [-] | | I have an iPhone 16 Pro Max and an older version of this battery I use and when I travel: https://a.co/d/3g3F4eC It can charge my MacBook Aur M2 once or my iPhone 16 Pro Max 3-4x. The iPhone itself can easily last flying and layovers all day. | | |
| ▲ | doubled112 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | https://a.co/d/igikGeL I'm not sure how many times it would charge our phones. One day I think we did 4 different ones without issue. When you're standing around at a BMX track, the functionality here actually made a lot of sense. It's not travel friendly in the same sense. We have named ours "the cube". Phone dead? Grab the cube. Tires soft? Grab the cube. Left the lights on in the car? You got it, the cube. |
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| ▲ | bubblemoth 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I think I agree with this. Especially since everything charges over usb-c now. Why would I buy a secondary battery for a single device when I could buy a backup battery that would charge my: - Phone - Watch - Laptop (x2) - Steam Deck - Tire inflator - Etc | |
| ▲ | wpm 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Because the "replacement" is "get two new AirPods". Even Apple can't take AirPods apart non-destructively. They are disposable. So much for their carbon neutrality. | | |
| ▲ | VogonPoetry 12 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Everything humans do is carbon negative. Breathing, eating, driving, pooping (Westerners: toilet paper, All: waste management) and building. Getting every human to be carbon neutral would be an amazing thing! From searched / online numbers, Apple has shipped 150 million AirPods since 2016. The AirPods 3 weigh 5.5g. The gross weight of a basic Tesla model 3 is 1760Kg. I picked a Tesla because it has plastic, metals, magnets, copper, lithium - similar materials. In the ~10 years Apple has been making AirPods the materials used (by weight) is ~ 470 Tesla cars. So, per year (avg, not really good for this), resources consumed is about 47 Teslas (by weight). Apple claims 40% of AirPods 3 are from recycled materials, so ~ 290 crashed / discarded Teslas could provide part of these materials - on average 29 per year. I did the above because it perceptually relates to "real things". Teslas are NOT carbon neutral, very much carbon negative. The reality / HORROR of waste is far, far worse. Any single plastic bag used to dispose of weekly waste likely weighs more than a pair of AirPods. Any can, made of steel or aluminum, could likely could make a lot of AirPods. The toy or product you bought that had a flap that you could lift up - there was likely a magnet under there. Any disposed single use battery might have zinc, if it was a CR2032 or "watch" battery, lithium (or silver). Yes, AirPods might be disposable. Do they improve the qualify of life of the humans that purchase them? What is the real cost in perspective - with everything else taken into consideration? If the AirPods are used to listen to music or entertainment, then the positive mental health aspects are likely significant in a positive value direction. | | |
| ▲ | gmueckl 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | A few random notes: - Your model neglects the charging case with its own battery and microcontroller. - A Trsla is more likely to be recycled properly than the same amount of earbuds. Itbis also more recycleable because ofnthe high amount of steel and other bulk materials in it. - The ratio of semiconductor electronics to total weight is extremely different between the two products. And semiconductor manufacturing is extremely resource intensive. All we typically see is squeaky clean neon lit clean rooms, which belie the use of high amounts of aggressive and toxic chemicals that have to be produced somewhere and generate waste that is never talked about. | | |
| ▲ | VogonPoetry 10 hours ago | parent [-] | | Many of these are all excellent points. I did exclude the case. The car recycling v.s. electronics recycling question is interesting. I once had a very interesting conversation with an electronics recycler on a plane trip - phones could not be recycled like other electronics because of some of the metals content - in particular beryllium copper content (used in spring contacts). He described it as a lot of electronics is ground up and a chemical processes used to extract the valuable elements. With phones the grinding up was the toxic / dangerous prohibited part. I think the semiconductor numbers are more subtle though. It is sq. mm in the product and yield that are factors. A single power switching element in a Tesla will likely exceed the total silicon sq. mm usage in an AirPod. There is a lot of electronics in a Tesla. Some of the Tesla circuitry is more exotic, Silicon Carbide or GaN. I need to look into how much recovery / reprocessing silicon mfg is using for the reagents. The waste produced isn't as bad as it was in the Silicon Valley heyday where every original mfg site is now a superfund site with very large plumes of toxic waste in the subsoil. |
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| ▲ | daedrdev 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Are you sure? They say they can replace a battery online | | |
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| ▲ | rectang 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I used to hate Airpods in videochats since they made the person wearing them sound bad because of dropouts, had heinous latency, and frequently disconnected causing meeting interruptions. But people think they're "better" than [wired] Earpods, which have none of those problems. /me shakes fist at cloud |
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| ▲ | op00to 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I've literally never seen any of those problems with Airpods in my meetings, and I'm in meetings A LOT. I can't remember the last time someone joined with audio issues in general! I personally use a Plantronics DECT headset which is ~12 years old and on its third battery, but otherwise an excellent workhorse. If I couldn't get another one of these headsets, I'd probably move to Airpods. | |
| ▲ | kshacker 9 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Sometimes it takes an event to change your view. I bought my first noise canceling sennheiser about a dozen years back. Hated it. Tried the noise canceling on my airpods. Hated it. Kept Airpods on transparency since most of my usage was during walking and I wanted to hear ambient sound, and never drown that out. Then never tried noise canceling this week while on the plane. I was like ... what happened? Now I am actively looking forward to it. I also used to hate airpods for their disconnects but they have become more reliable, especially if you tell them to remain connected to the last device you manually connected to. Meetings / video chats are an anti-pattern for sure. There is so much communication loss because of other factors - someone forgot to mute, someone forgot to mute, plus what not. You want your side of the communication to be pristine, and even if airpods flake out 1/20 times, it is not good. I agree with you on that. | |
| ▲ | Marsymars 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | If I could do so, I would mandate that everyone at my workplace must use a wired headset with a boom mic for every Teams call. | | |
| ▲ | AdrianB1 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I used a couple of Plantronics 5200 until they died (~ 4-5 years each) and they were excellent for a wireless headset. Pods are indeed dubious. | |
| ▲ | fragmede 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | You're fucking disgusting. You'd force people to use Teams? | | |
| ▲ | op00to 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I love the skeumorphic campfire style room layout of Teams, with the talking heads. It's hilarious. | |
| ▲ | Marsymars 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Hah, I laughed. But seriously, I don’t love Teams overall, but for business video conferencing, what’s actually better? I’d take Teams over Zoom or Google Meet. Haven’t tried any others. | | |
| ▲ | fragmede 33 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Phew, wasn't sure that would land :) For video conferencing only, it's pretty okay. It's that it's terrible for instant messaging and group chats and everything else that it gets used for that makes it an exercise in getting papercut to death. Meet is a lot friendlier about not having to download a client and just use a web browser, so that's nice for clients. It's not great for messaging and group chats either though. The problem with Zoom is that a lot of people use it for personal use, but aren't tech savvy enough, so occasionally you'll get PantsPooper69 joining a business meeting until they change it right after joining, if they notice. |
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| ▲ | kjkjadksj 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I still use my earpods. Great for zoom or phone calls. Terrible for music but everything in that form factor is compared to my studio monitor over ears. I tasted the forbidden fruit already. |
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| ▲ | internet2000 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > I do feel like there is some man shaking fist at cloud here. The poster himself admits that after a meandering 2000 words... > I found a lot of reactions to these products to be weirdly optimistic. Either I’m becoming more cynical with age and general tech fatigue, or certain people are easily impressed. |
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| ▲ | op00to 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| The Airpods Pro 2 are probably the "best" headphones I've owned when you weigh sound quality, ease of use, convenience, etc. I've owned many, many sets of headphones over the years. The AirPods Pro 2 got the most use by far. |
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| ▲ | bombcar 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| AirPods are one of Apple’s best products in forever and their size forgives them battery complaints, to me. Even phones and laptops I’m willing to give a pass on, ever since USB-C got “good enough” and the battery life long enough. If I had one complaint it’d be that they should sell one fat phone with no camera hump (because it has more battery). Edit: I should have clarified as AirPods Pro are the ones I have experience with; no idea how the original AirPods are. But the Pros are phenomenal. |
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| ▲ | MangoToupe 13 hours ago | parent [-] | | Airpods are very, very expensive compared to competitors with 90% of the same features. I've been using a $30 set for several years and the main drawback is it's difficult to switch devices—because apple doesn't allow third parties to use access the proprietary comms that allows this for airpods. Also, I think the white is ugly. But kids seem to love it. | | |
| ▲ | oliyoung 12 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I'll happily pay the premium for "it just works", especially device switching iPhone to iPad to MacBook to Apple TV, it works first time, every time. I have a pair of Sony XM5s, and even at that price point, pairing and device switching can be a crapshoot some of the time. Bluetooth honestly feels like a non-deterministic stack sometimes, it even took Apple 4 years to support it on the iPhone, how they have the AirPods working is close to magic. | | |
| ▲ | mschuster91 6 hours ago | parent [-] | | > how they have the AirPods working is close to magic They control the entire ecosystem and keep the variants and with it, the testing complexity, down as far as possible. That's how Apple stuff works so damn seamlessly. Meanwhile, the rest of the world has to contend with dozens if not hundreds of Bluetooth chipsets, driver combinations, OS stacks... and each of these has their own quirks, and even if a bug gets fixed in a Bluetooth driver or controller firmware, good luck getting that distributed to users... |
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| ▲ | hedora 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | AirPods (and Bose QuietComfort) make me dizzy/nauseous. Also, they don’t have decent passive noise cancellation, so they’re not appropriate for mowing the lawn, etc. My Sennheiser ear buds solve all these problems for a much lower price, and their sound quality is much better than the last pair of AirPods I tried. To each their own, I guess. | | |
| ▲ | kjkjadksj 9 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | It should be stated that noise cancellation is not hearing protection, if you were using it for that while mowing. An old groundskeepers trick for having music and ear protection is to get those big over ear protectors and put your buds on with that over them, just being mindful of volume of course. | |
| ▲ | lurking_swe 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | well to be fair, some people simply don’t tolerate ANC well. Likely due to a more sensitive vestibular system. I believe this group often (not always) also struggles with motion sickness. |
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| ▲ | bombcar 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | You absolutely know they have tanks and tanks of colored plastic ready to hit those molds the moment sales slow down a tiny bit ... | |
| ▲ | raw_anon_1111 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I doubt very seriously your $30 headphones sound as good as AirPods Pro or have the ANC. But you can buy much cheaper headphones with the H1 chip for fast switching between devices by buying one of the Beats headphones. I love my $60 Beats Fiex with the double flange ear tips for traveling. | | |
| ▲ | BeetleB a minute ago | parent | next [-] | | I bought my Soundcore A40 for about $60 (occasionally goes on sale for $40). I don't doubt the Airpods Pro is better. But not "pay an extra $200 better".[1] My ANC is pretty decent. Sound quality's quite good. Adjusts to my hearing frequencies. Etc. (The A40 has a much better battery life). [1] Unless you need a hearing aid. Then it's a steal. | |
| ▲ | MangoToupe 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I have proper over-ear headphones for when I want to listen to music. I'm not sure what ANC is or why it's worth hundreds of dollars—hence why I said 90%. I don't know what the h1 chip has to do with the fast switching—surely this is a bluetooth protocol detail, yea? | | |
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| ▲ | dmbche 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Don't most people use nondescript earbuds? |
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| ▲ | jandrewrogers 12 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I rarely see any earbuds except AirPods in the US, they are the overwhelming majority. Several other countries I’ve worked in also have pretty ubiquitous AirPods penetration, though not quite at the level of the US. I have a few friends that bought every inexpensive alternative to AirPods, had a poor experience with all of them, finally relented and bought AirPods. Now they won’t use anything else. They spent more money avoiding AirPods than buying them. Apple did a really good job with the AirPods. | | |
| ▲ | dmbche 8 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I'm suprised, might just have been lucky I got a pair of Jlab pro whatever for 30$ at Canadian Tire and have been getting other ones when I lose them for years now - never thought of shopping for something else. | |
| ▲ | markemer 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Especially if you're in the ecosystem. I can use them with all my devices, and they switch seamlessly. | |
| ▲ | kjkjadksj 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | It was like that in the wired earpod era too. It just carried over when they dumped the headphone jack and sold you the airpod you didn't need before. I still remember those early ipod commercials with the silhouettes dancing with the white cord. |
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| ▲ | swiftcoder 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | A lot of those nondescript earbuds are indistinguishable from AirPods at a distance. Every electronics store around here sells $30 AirPod knock-offs that one has to look pretty closely at to tell they are not the genuine article. | |
| ▲ | daedrdev 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | A casual search showed several studies over several years estimating 70-80% of young people owning airpods, which matched my irl expirence. In the past random earbuds and headphones were common but apple has taken the market by storm. |
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